18-year-old woman's sudden obsession with Despicable Me was secret sign of rare brain disease
A woman who suddenly became obsessed with the Frozen soundtrack and watching Despicable Me says it was a secret sign of a rare brain-swelling disease.
Elise Seymour, 18, just wanted to stay in her hotel room and watch kids TV for the last three days of her vacation in Rhodes in September 2025.
She listened to Disney songs for her entire journey home and also felt confused, agitated, and very tired.
After a seizure she was rushed to hospital on September 28, 2025, and continued to experience seizures before being admitted on October 12.
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Elise was diagnosed with a rare brain illness called autoimmune anti-N-methyl-D-aspartate (NMDA) receptor encephalitis, on October 17, 2025.
This is a rare life-threatening illness where a person's immune system attacks its own brain cells, causing them to become swollen.
Elise's obsession with childhood films and music was her brain responding to the trauma of the swelling, she said, and something she says was 'flagged' by doctors in later check-ups.
Elise, a waitress from Hampshire, UK, said: "I am so lucky to be alive. I'd never heard of this illness so I didn't realise I was getting very unwell.
"Going back to my childhood was the most prominent symptom for me. A therapist explained it's my brain going back to a time it can remember which feels safe.
"Looking back it's clear that something was definitely not right. I was just lying there laughing at the TV. I honestly felt like a four-year-old, it was very confusing."
Elise was on vacation in Rhodes with her then partner when she started struggling to understand what he was saying. But she thought her ears were blocked from swimming.
She said: "I kept saying 'what are you saying to me?'
"Everything just sounded like gibberish."
She had extreme tiredness but put it down to having flu just before the vacation.
On her three-and-a-half hour flight home she stared straight ahead and didn't communicate. Elise listened to the Frozen soundtrack all the way home from London Gatwick Airport.
She said: "I have no memory of that flight. Things felt a bit less confusing at home, I think because of the familiarity."
When home she couldn't count to ten or say the alphabet and spent the next week mostly in bed, watching Minions and laughing along to Despicable Me.
She even fell asleep with her head in her plate while out for a curry.
"I couldn't do anything," she said. "I was just crying hysterically, I was very very scared. I thought 'If I can't count to ten I've got no future'.
"I couldn't remember things at work that I've known for over a year."
After getting an achy and stiff back and neck she had a seizure while in the shower.
She was taken by ambulance to Basingstoke and North Hampshire Hospital where her heart and blood pressure was checked and they confirmed she'd had a seizure and sent her home after scans were clear and she was monitored for a few hours.
"It was terrifying," she said, "I woke surrounded by paramedics, I had no idea what had happened. My head was hurting.
"My partner said I'd been trembling on the floor. I'd bitten my tongue very badly."
Elise continued to have seizures, and was sent back to hospital after having one at a routine GP appointment on October 12.
She had another seizure in the waiting room. Elise became hysterical and staff thought she had psychosis, so she was sedated.
A lumbar puncture showed Elise has raised immunological activity, and an MRI scan showed inflammation in her brain, and irregular brain activity.
A neurologist started treating her for autoimmune anti NMDA receptor encephalitis, with immunoglobulin and steroids - on October 15.
Her behavior reminded him of a film he'd seen called Brain on Fire about someone with the disease, she said.
Blood tests at a specialist centre in Oxford confirmed that she had autoimmune anti NMDA receptor encephalitis.
Elise went home on October 28 and was prescribed steroids which she took 40mg of every morning to help with the inflammation and Omeprazole to support her body, which she tapered down and stopped taking last month.
The causes of autoimmune anti NMDA receptor encephalitis are not fully understood, some autoimmune encephalitis can come on after an infection like a cold, according to Great Ormond Street Hospital's website.
The illness starts with confusion and memory loss, and progresses to seizures and movement loss, usually over a few weeks.
Elise believes she got the illness because of stress and burnout after her A-levels and starting work. She had to relearn everything, she said, including how to speak, write, and play her guitar.
She still has problems with short-term memory, but went back to work in February.
Elise said: "It's so important that people know about this illness. I am extremely lucky to be alive, and so grateful to have survived this. I was a completely different person.
"If you spot changes like this in yourself or someone you know get help straight away. Trust your instincts, and, even if nobody believes you, keep trying.
"It isn't worth the risk of waiting."
Topics: UK News, Health, Film and TV, Disney, Music
Niamh Shackleton